


Cold Iron

by InsertSthMeaningful



Category: X-Men (Alternate Timeline Movies)
Genre: (or is he?), Alternate Universe - Medieval, Bottom Erik Lehnsherr, Captivity, Dark Fantasy, Enemies to Lovers, Erik Lehnsherr is not a Happy Bunny, Eventual Smut, Fae & Fairies, Fae Erik Lehnsherr, Honestly Charles What Are You Thinking, Human Charles Xavier, M/M, Power Imbalance, Rimming, bannedtogetherbingo2020
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-07
Updated: 2020-10-07
Packaged: 2021-03-07 22:13:13
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,046
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26874985
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/InsertSthMeaningful/pseuds/InsertSthMeaningful
Summary: There is a Fae chained up in the dungeons of King Xavier's castle, and Charles hardly knows what to make of it.So, he does the only thing imaginable - he falls under the Fae's spell.
Relationships: Erik Lehnsherr/Charles Xavier
Comments: 18
Kudos: 57
Collections: Banned Banned Together Bingo 2020, Banned Together Bingo 2020





	Cold Iron

**Author's Note:**

> This is my fill for the BannedTogetherBingo2020 prompt “Fantasy” – I couldn’t stop thinking about a Cherik LOTR AU and my brain came up with this instead. Talk about missing the mark. 
> 
> All my thanks to the lovely [FlightInFlame](https://archiveofourown.org/users/flightinflame) for the beta 🥰 
> 
> If you’re 18+, come join us on the [X-Men X-Traordinaire](https://discord.gg/wqkPMEr) discord server!

“My, I would rather have the skin flayed off my back than miss our daily hour of tea and talk. You always make for such entertaining company.”

The only chair in the room – its wood rickety and rotten from the dungeons’ humidity – creaks ominously as Charles settles down and stretches one stiff leg away from his body. Sighing, he contemplates the contrast between his richly clad figure and their rather dire surroundings. His shined boots, the guards’ glinting helmets, even the well-used but cared-for porcelain tea set on the iron table in front of him – they’re a rare, utterly out-of-place sight in the dark and damp of Westchester Castle’s prison.

Charles shakes his head, clacks his tongue disapprovingly. “Really, I take care never to be too late or too early with our afternoon tea – and yet you will never address me a word.”

The Fae cowering by his feet slowly lifts its gaze. There is a sizzle from the iron chains clamping down around its neck, wrists and ankles as they follow the movement.

For days now, Charles’ newest catch – a creature from the World Beyond The Veil, disguising its Otherness with the body of a lithe and gorgeous man – has been silent. It was silent when he stalked it in the undergrowth of the sunny woods growing at the Westernmost border of Westchester, at the foot of the tallest mountain peaks of the continent, after its ash-white shock of hair had caught his attention. But for a groan of betrayed surprise, it was silent when he shot an arrow with a head of pure, sharp iron through its left shoulder and then proceeded to haul it out of the forest onto the open, windswept plains of his kingdom as it convulsed and spasmed with pain. It was silent when his men dragged it through the courtyard of his castle, down the very stairs he just descended minutes ago and chained it with the one material it and its kind is so inauspiciously vulnerable to.

Despite all it has been put through, the Fae is silent and impassive and utterly useless to Charles’ purposes.

And yet, he cannot bring himself to deal the final killing blow. Fae have no soul to torture, no spirit to break – every human child has heard the tales and sung the stories of their heartless cruelty – so he should feel no remorse about taking a life which has never been truly lived. He could lift his sword, swing it in a wide, elegant arc the way Raven has taught him, and it would all be over.

But the Fae is as beautiful as it is stoic, even tied down and grounded as it has found itself in Charles’ dungeon. And its beauty is what mesmerises Charles so utterly and completely, which compels him to limp down those damned irregular dungeon steps every day at the exact time when the chapel’s clock strikes the fourth hour in the afternoon. It is what has saved the Fae’s neck so far.

“Come on now,” he murmurs, taunting, and wedges the tip of his boot under the creature’s sharply cut chin to tip its gaunt face up and into the light. He is met with no resistance. “Talk to me.”

The Fae meets his eyes with its own – each of them a swirling vortex of grey and green and blue, and in the privacy of his head, Charles often likens them to the sea in the breathless moment just before the storm hits the shore – presses its already delicate lips into an even finer line – and says nothing.

Charles explodes, “ _Damn you!_ ”, and surges forward in his seat to replace the tip of his boot with the harsh and unforgiving grip of fingers. The Fae’s chin is cool and angular in his grasp, and he squeezes tightly, wants the sorry creature to feel how much nerve it is costing him not to carve its heart from its chest right then and there.

“ _Speak_ ,” he growls, face so close to that of the Fae that he thinks he can almost taste its weariness, it’s endless pain on his tongue, “speak, or I’ll have your head, so help me God.”

A widening of those vortex eyes. A silent plea in the twitch of an eyelash, maybe a figment of Charles’ gratuitous imagination, maybe more – and it is all it takes for Charles’ agitation to abate, for him to release his iron grip and to lean back on his chair. The three guards by the door have sprung forward, and he waves them away without even sparing them a glance.

“Alright then. Let’s recapitulate.” His hands itching for something to hold onto, Charles reaches for his delicate porcelain cup on the low iron table and takes a sip, doing his best not to frown at the stale lukewarm liquid within pretending to be tea. “Either you talk and tell me your name, the scope of your powers and the hideous plans your kind are hatching against my kingdom, or I will simply walk out of this door, throw away the key and let you rot in here for the rest of Westchester’s eternal reign.”

At first, he thinks the infuriating creature will once again refuse the olive branch he is tending; thinks he will regrettably have to make true on his word and lock the Fae away until it is nothing but a mysterious captive behind a door never to be opened again by anyone at all.

But then, the Fae opens its lips, and a voice like the rasp of a dagger on a whetstone trickles forth. It is music to Charles’ ears.

“That would be more of a blessing than a curse, believe me.”

Charles purses his lips. “Excuse me?”

Finally, _finally_ , after what feels like a lifetime of waiting, the Fae frowns back, its eyes flashing murder. “You. Walking out on me and finally leaving me in peace. That would be a blessing.”

“And _that_ almost sounds like a challenge.” Charles cocks an eyebrow. “Do you _want_ me to leave you here to rot, bound and chained and lonely as you are?”

When the Fae locks eyes with him this time, its carefully composed indifference has bled from its gaze. All that is left now is pride and blank, searing hatred.

“You pesky humans with your pesky chains,” the creature hisses, bare body trembling with unshed rage. “Thinking they could hold me and my kind. You want to know my name and my power?”

It is Charles’ turn to remain stoically silent. In a languid, deliberate arc, he lets his eyes sweep over the Fae’s kneeling form – over its bent, knotted shoulders dragged down by the weight of its bounds; the vast plains of its bronze skin, sullen with the dirt and grime of the dungeons; its slim, slender hands just barely covering its shame. Before they chained it up, the prison guards stripped it of all its clothes and dignity, and more often than not, Charles thinks he ought to thank them for their service.

The Fae sneers as it catches onto his unashamed contemplation of its body. “I am Erik of the Eisenhardt bloodline. Our dominion is that of all things metal, and if I so wanted, I could rip this castle from its moorings.”

Now this is new. Charles smooths a hand over the primly embroidered velvet of his tunic and frowns, putting all the doubt he can muster into the gesture.

“Then why haven’t you escaped yet?”

A sliver of something unfurls in the depths of the Fae’s eyes – smugness? Or is it playing for time? – and it dawns on Charles that their game has only just begun.

“You intrigue me.”

“I… _intrigue_ you?” Charles shrugs. “Likewise, I guess.”

Just as the Fae opens its mouth for a reply – or maybe it would have been just another insult, or, as much as Charles knows that it is wishful thinking on his part, a passionate plea for release – the sound of the chapel’s clock announcing the start of the fifth hour of the afternoon filters down the dungeon stairs.

“Well, this is it for today then,” Charles says and gets up, taking his blackwood cane from his guards with a grateful nod. “I’m afraid I have to get back to my kingly duties. You will see me again tomorrow, and please, if you decide to break away after all, do at least leave the servants’ quarters intact. They are only following orders.”

There is no answer from Erik this time. But even after he has limped from the room and the guards have shut and locked the heavy oak door behind him, Charles can feel the Fae’s gaze burning through his skull and into the deepest depths of his mind.

The next day, Charles enters the cell with fresh cups and a steaming jug of tea in his hands to find Erik lying curled up on his side in the exact same spot he left him – no, _it_ , Charles scolds himself – yesterday, collared down and with its wrists and ankles still bound firmly together.

“I thought I heard you say that you could control iron.” He makes his way over to the table to set his load down, then pulls his chair over. “Why have you not long fled your chains, then?”

The Fae remains silent, its pale gaze fixed on Charles’ boots. The skin around its shackles blisters.

Careful not to spill any of the boiling hot liquid, Charles pours two cups of tea. “How ironic. The very element your powers allow you to command is the one substance that will keep you and your gift subdued.”

“Though weakened, I could still slit your throat where you stand,” Erik hisses.

“And pray tell me, what good would that do you?”

For the first time since he stepped foot over the dungeon’s doorsill today, the Fae’s eyes flicker up to meet Charles’ gaze. What he can read in them is neither contempt nor pride.

“I thought so.” Setting the earthen jug of tea down, Charles reaches into the folds of his thick cloak – the weather has turned overnight, bringing grey, uniform clouds and a wind that bites your cheeks whenever you hurry across the courtyard – and pulls the dungeon’s wad of keys forth. He kneels ungracefully, smiling when he catches Erik’s puzzled gaze. “Since you were so beautifully behaved yesterday – I thought you would never speak – I have decided to reward you for your labours.”

Its once petal-white hair streaked with dirt from the freezing stone floor and soot from the guards’ torches, the Fae huffs even as Charles grips the shackles around his wrists and riffles through the set of keys for the right one. Only a twitch of its eyelashes betrays the pain it must feel whenever its bounds are jarred.

“You are playing with fire, human,” Erik growls as the key creaks in the lock. “You’ve even left your guards outside the door this day.”

“Don’t worry. I haven’t suddenly started to trust you overnight.” The shackles have barely given way when Charles reaches into his cloak a second time and draws the translucent dagger which he requested this morning from his armoury master. Carved from crystal as clear as water and as hard as marble, it glints with menace as he wedges its blade under Erik’s chin. “You may think me slow, a cripple in everything but name – but you should know that I have not remained on the throne for so long out of sheer dumb luck.”

Eyes locked with Charles’, the Fae withdraws its wrists from the iron chains, fingers coming to rub at the marks left there and jerking away when they touch the blistered skin. “You won’t kill me.”

Charles gives a shrug. The edge of the dagger has caught on the delicate skin of Erik’s throat, nicked a crimson hairline into the shimmering bronze just above the iron collar around the creature’s slender neck. A single drop of blood spills forth from the cut when Charles replies, “Whyever not? You are of no use to me.”

Then, he presses the dull side of the dagger under Erik’s chin and upwards, and Erik follows his lead obediently until he is kneeling, hands once again folded over his lap and doing absolutely nothing to conceal his shame.

“You might not trust me now,” the Fae rasps, “but I can see the desire in your eyes. First, you will want to hear my story, and after that… you will want to hear me.”

Its eyes, now level with Charles’, are no longer the clear grey of a storm about to hit the shore. Dark has bled into them, a flame of wantonness burning black in black.

Charles’ palms are sweaty. He tightens his grip on the blade and says, voice as light as he can manage, “You should know that wilful seduction of the King can result in the penalty of death, my friend.”

Erik’s smile is as sweet as plums gathered at the height of summer. “My King, you don’t want me dead.”

Slowly, deliberately, Charles draws the dagger away from the Fae’s throat to point it straight at its heart instead. When he speaks, he is chilled to the bone by how rough his voice sounds. “You really believe that?”

“Do you want me to beg? Do you want me to grapple at your feet, plead for you not to let me freeze and starve to death in this damp, damned place?” There is something mocking to the tilt of Erik’s head, to its ( _his_ ) bloodless hands folded so gracefully on its ( _his_ ) lap. “I can do that.”

Charles staggers to his feet with a jolt, sheathing the dagger with shaky fingers. “Enough. _Enough_.” The tea set on table rattles as he grabs hold of its cool iron edge, his fingers cramping painfully. “I will return no sooner than when you have laid off this mischievous rubbish you are spouting, when you have come back to your senses.”

“Or when you have.”

The Fae’s brittle laughter follows Charles all the way through the door and up the winding stairs, clings to the fur-lining of his coat even as the cold winter sun douses him in its white-pure glare. His knees are weak, and he has to hold onto his walking cane harder than ever lest he topple over onto the dry tamped floor of the courtyard. The guards, mercifully in the dark about what has unfolded between their King and the Fae, shoot him befuddled glances as they escort him through the parapet walk leading up to his throne room.

Charles’ heart beats a wild staccato in unison with Erik’s laugh which won’t stop ringing in his ears – and never before has he felt more alive.

He doesn’t visit Erik for three days after that. Life at court is all too busy, now that winter is tightening its icy jaws on his lands, and he has audiences from dawn to dusk. Granaries have to be opened to the poorer folk, the nobility appeased, and routes of transportation devised.

Westchester needs a leading hand with all its heart and soul.

Then, on the evening of the third day, the first snow falls and the castle’s jailer drops down onto one knee in front of Charles’ throne.

“Your Majesty,” she gasps, her breath rising in pale plumes into the frosty air, “the Fae is dying.”

Charles spins round from where he is supposed to sign a contract with the Guild of Trappers, the quill in his hand spraying ink everywhere. “ _What?_ ”

“Its eyes are closed. The rise and fall of its chest has nearly ceased, and a sickly pallor has come over its cheeks.” The woman, otherwise so composed and calm as a rock in the surf, trembles where she is kneeling in front of her King. “I beg forgiveness of thee, your Majesty – I should have noticed its dwindling state earlier.”

Charles shakes his head, though his heart is fluttering in his chest like a wounded bird. “Let us not cry over spilt milk. The Fae chose death for itself by behaving as it did. Call your guards away from its cell door and let it pass in silence.”

“Yes, my King.” The jailer nods, relief flooding her face, before she gets up from the freezing stone floor and hurries off to do his bidding.

On his throne, swathed in layers of velvet and fur against the gnawing cold, Charles stares after her until her figure is swallowed by the descending gloom outside.

Erik is dying. This defiant, utterly bedazzling creature he has only just met is fading away. And there is nothing he can do about it if he does not want to risk his and Westchester’s reputation.

“Your Majesty?”

One of his advisors draws his attention back to the treaty at hand, and Charles nods and wields his quill.

“Of course. Now, what were your objections concerning the tribute to the nobles?”

And yet, there _is_ something to be done.

This night, Charles tells his servants to run a hot bath, prepare ointments and bandages for wound care and then retreat from his quarters until sunrise. Silent and without doubts, they heed his wishes, and by the time the chapel’s clock strikes midnight, Charles is alone in his ivory tower.

In the corner of his bedchamber, the wooden bathtub lined with linen steams quietly. But for the glow of the crackling fireplace beside it and the covered cast-iron lantern in Charles’ hands, the room is shrouded in shadows.

“Well then,” he groans and hoists himself onto his one good and one bad leg, “what has to be done will be done.”

Save for a few guards and the occasional torch lighter, the castle is fast asleep as he limps through its deserted hallways. The ones he encounters bow to him before they hurry on, far too tired or far too busy to care for what their King is up to this time. And Charles is glad for that.

He takes a secret passageway only half the royal household knows about, the one which spits him out right in the middle of the dungeons. The guards there are little more heedful, talking quietly amongst each other or playing dice. Their eyes turn sheepish when they recognise their nightly visitor, but he reassures them with a secretive smile.

Sooner than he would wish, he is standing in front of Erik’s cell door. The Fae’s guards have abandoned their posts, as he ordered only hours ago, and there is but a heavy oak bolt separating Charles from his target.

Sighing, he puts his lantern down and gets to work hauling the block of wood back and sideways. The door’s hinges creak in agony but swing open obediently.

Beyond, there is inky blackness and silence. Charles picks up his light and enters, watching his step on the slippery ground covered with straw and other substances which he would rather not discern.

Then, the glow of the lantern falls onto the still form of the Fae, curled up amidst the soot and grime of the floor, pale gaze shut away behind its gossamer eyelids, and his heart halts in his chest.

Erik is not breathing. Or is he?

Charles kneels, the scabbard of his crystal dagger digging into his stiff thigh tingling with pain, and extends a hand. Careful now, careful. The Fae are known for their trickery, their predilection for the occasional treacherous ambush.

But Charles’ fingers graze Erik’s cold cheek, and nothing happens.

“Erik?” Charles murmurs, cupping the Fae’s face in both hands now, growing bolder. “Erik. Erik from Eisenhardt, wake up.”

The Fae’s head is heavy and limp and freezing in his grasp, like marble, like a dead man’s body. Of course, _of course_. Charles should not have waited so long, should not have abandoned this poor creature to the cold and the chains. This is the price he pays.

He already makes to get up and vanish from this cursed cell, when a fluttering movement catches in the corner of his eye. Heart palpitating, he turns.

Erik the Fae is staring up at him from where he has bedded its head back on the ground. Small, translucent puffs of breath escape from between its lips, and its chest heaves and sinks irregularly.

“Oh, you bastard,” Charles mutters at the same time as Erik rasps, “You came.”

“I did.” Swiftly, Charles digs the keys from his tunic and slips them into the lock for the shackles around Erik’s ankles. “God help me, but I did. No creature deserves such cruel an end.”

“Not even me?” the Fae breathes, shivering as Charles pulls his cloak from his shoulders and wraps it around its pale frame.

“Not even you,” he concedes and pulls a circle of glimmering metal from the folds of his tunic.

Erik’s eyes widen as they catch sight of the new, slimmer collar. “What is that?”

“Cold Iron.” Charles slips it around the Fae’s throat and fastens it before he unlocks the last chain, unfazed by Erik’s murderous glare. “Forged in a smithy as cool as possible so it would preserve its innate properties – which are keeping you and your kind tame.”

“You should have left me to die,” Erik spits even as he accepts Charles helping shoulder and struggles upright, swaying like reed in the breeze. “ _Anything_ is better than this accursed slave mark–”

“For tonight, you are alive, and you should wish to keep it that way,” Charles barks as he tightens his grip on Erik’s hips and wrist, careful not to raise his voice lest he draw attention to them. Now comes the tricky part – slipping past every eye which could see and every mouth which could talk. But Charles has grown up in this castle, and if there ever was an inconspicuous way back to the King’s quarters, he should know about it. “Let me worry about the rest, will you?”

The Fae says nothing – only sulks and stares – and to Charles, this is as good an answer as anything.

Erik’s groans of contempt turn into yowls of pain as soon as he dips a toe into the bathwater. Charles just rolls his eyes and takes his cloak back, well-aware that this leaves the Fae with no option but to cower down into the wooden tub if he doesn’t want to stand utterly bare and vulnerable before him.

Erik, though, seems to have no such qualms. Proud and upright and _naked_ , he stands in the bathtub and scowls. His slim iron collar glints in the glow of the candles Charles is lighting, like a metallic snake coiling around his throat.

“So you have decided to boil me alive?” the Fae hisses, fixing Charles with his swirling gaze.

Charles comes over and dips a finger into the bathwater, frowning all while keeping his eyes firmly to himself. “What are you talking about? It’s hardly lukewarm.”

“You would not say that if you had laid in the cold for days on end and were chilled to the bone.”

“Of course. Forgive me.” Charles sighs. “It seems we will have to do this the old-fashioned way, then.”

Erik’s scrutinising eyes follow him closely as he limps over to the fireplace, takes one of the earthen jugs from its mantelpiece and returns to dip it into the bathtub until it is filled to the brim. Then, Charles gestures for Erik to turn around.

The Fae stiffens. “Are you going to knife me in the back?”

“My, so mistrustful,” Charles chuckles. “No, my dear friend. I think you’ll rather enjoy this.”

Begrudgingly, Erik obeys. Charles pulls his sleeves up over his elbows, then takes hold of Erik’s upper arm and starts pouring the cooling water down the Fae’s back.

Fortunately for both of them, he has the intended effect: The caked-up grime and soot begin to wash away at the same time as Erik softens under Charles’ touch, the tension bleeding from his shoulders.

“There, there,” Charles murmurs, and as he gingerly continues to rub the dirt from the Fae’s back and eases him down into the water, he keeps talking, whispering soothing nothings and explaining going-ons Erik surely isn’t interested in but still doesn’t object to hearing.

He restores the snowy white of Erik’s hair with the mountain laurel soap which travelling merchants from the East will trade with Westchester every spring. He scents the water with oil of the white sage his people collect and process in the South of his Kingdom, and when he takes a nail scissor to Erik’s hands and says, “You will not like this,” he is promptly proven right.

And then, as he restocks the fire to warm more water in a copper cauldron, Erik asks the very question Charles has been dreading since he came to that resolution in the throne room.

“Why are you doing this?”

Suddenly dejected, Charles sinks onto a wooden stool by the bathtub’s side. Arms slung around his knees, the Fae is watching him, his lips a firmly set line of cruel determination. In the past few minutes, colour has returned to his cheeks, his skin once again warm to the touch.

Charles simply says, “I don’t know. I should have left you to die, for if my alleged sympathy for your kind is found out, Westchester’s future is in peril. But you…”

The cooling water sloshing, Erik unfurls and rises to straddle the bathtub’s linen-lined rim. “No man is beyond the wants of the flesh – least of all you, King of Westchester.”

Charles should rage. He should refute such an improper allegation, should draw his dagger and have Erik’s head right then and there for what he has said.

Instead, he nods wearily and mumbles, “Call me Charles.”

The look his Fae shoots him is beyond bemused.

So, he decides to reciprocate. “And you? Why haven’t you maimed me yet and taken off for wherever you came from? Here, there is plenty of metal for you to slit my throat with.”

Charles’ words have an immediate effect, and the glare Erik shoots him could burn bridges.

“The iron shackles did their part, but it is your hunger which has left me exhausted. Drained.” The Fae glances tellingly at the blisters on his wrist. “The wound from the arrow you shot through me might have healed, and my stomach may not hunger yet, but these will take their sweet time.”

Charles takes this as his cue to get up and offer Erik a towel, which the Fae hesitantly accepts. “Those wounds need tending to.” Then, he turns away to draw up the salves and ointments he had his healers prepare this very evening, guilt gnawing at his insides. “My hunger? What do you mean by that?”

There is the quiet splashing of water and the rustle of soft linen behind his back as Erik steps out of the bathtub to dry off. All of Charles’ willpower goes into not turning around to watch.

“Your dreams.”

“Beg your pardon?”

“The dreams you sent me were very vivid and… imaginative. Don’t pretend you don’t know what I’m talking about.” Erik rounds the table Charles is hunched over and perches on the edge, all graceful angles and otherworldly skin. “I did not know you practised mind magic, my King.”

“What are you talking about? I don’t,” Charles mutters, distracted by the task of ladling hyleberry salve onto a strip of cotton. Then, careful not to let his eyes stray downwards where the towel is clinging low to the Fae’s waist, he takes Erik’s wrist and begins to dab at the band of blisters with a dry cloth. “Many winters ago, when I was still a youth, I was taught mind magic by one of my father’s advisors, Elizabeth Braddock. But my studies ceased when she was sent away by my stepfather, shortly after he and his son usurped my throne. I took it back and banished them, yet all my searching for her was for nought – she had vanished, never to step foot into my court again.”

“She was a Fae.”

“ _Excuse me?_ ”

Erik hisses when Charles’ grip around his wrist tightens. “She must have come from Beyond The Veil to bestow upon you our magic – why she would waste her potential on a mere mortal I do not know – and her spells have clung to your head to this day. They allowed you to draw me into your dreams and take from me what you would not take in the real world.”

Despite him doing his best to stay composed, to stay indifferent, Charles feels the blood rising in his cheeks. His distorted mind did indeed dream up some utterly debauched scenarios over the last three nights, unaware that even in the privacy of his own head, he was not safe.

“My apologies for inconveniencing you,” he murmurs and gingerly wraps a bandage around the Fae’s strip of blistered skin.

“I was rather hoping you would make true on your fantasies.” Erik primly offers him the other wrist, paying no attention to Charles’ spluttering. “Beyond The Veil, mating is revered for its restorative properties.”

Taking a deep breath, Charles gets to work at the second band of blisters. He should nip this madman’s idea in the bud now, before he will shame his kingdom even more – but isn’t he already on the verge of ruin, anyway? “You truly are hellbent on getting into my bed, aren’t you?”

“I see no second one around here, and I am certainly not sleeping on the rug.”

Erik’s smirk when Charles looks up should not be as blinding as it is.

Charles catches Erik’s piercing stare out of the corner of his eyes while he is shedding his outermost layers, getting ready for bed.

“I thought you were exhausted,” he hears himself say through the haze of want and greed which has been inundating his senses ever since he finished tending to the Fae’s wounds and watched Erik slip under the covers of _Charles’_ bed, prop himself up on _Charles’_ pillows and rub his scent into _Charles’_ linen sheets. It is infuriating – knowing that he would only have to cross the room to get his hands on what he desires, but at the same time being utterly aware of how dearly it would cost him and his kingdom if anyone ever found out about his depraved tastes.

“My King,” Erik purrs, pupils widening as he finally watches Charles approaching, “your oh-so courteous care has done wonders for my condition.”

Charles groans and lowers himself onto the corner of the mattress, his bad leg gripped by a throbbing ache which has been growing stronger ever since dusk fell over Westchester. A raging snowstorm must be building up beyond the mountains. “Has it now?”

The Fae is by his side in a heartbeat, taking the hem of Charles’ undershirt in his long, slim fingers and tugging. “Let me help you,” he rasps, voice rough in Charles’ ear like frozen gravel crushed under a boot’s heel.

“I am tiring of this,” Charles sighs, even though this isn’t exactly the whole truth. “It has been a long night.”

Erik’s breath fans over the sensitive skin of his neck, soft, searing, the Cold Iron collar around his neck glinting at the periphery of Charles’ vision. “I can make it even longer.”

Charles turns his head to object, to tell the Fae just how dangerous a game they are playing – and Erik leans forward, captures Charles’ lips in a kiss which is so unexpectedly tender, so jarringly cool, that Charles’ heart skips a beat.

When Erik draws back, pupils blown wide and dark, Charles can’t help swaying forward to chase after Erik’s taste, the feather-light touch of his mouth. He sees Erik’s triumphant grin, can read the victory in his eyes, but he finds he does not care.

“Lay on your back,” he commands, “throw that towel aside and keep still. If you even so much as twitch a finger, I will find ways to make you regret it.”

“Yes, my King,” the Fae breathes and obeys.

Charles shakes his head, amazed that he can still form coherent thoughts despite his arousal smothering his logical thinking. “And for the last time: Call me Charles.”

Quickly, he gets back up, fingers shaking as he makes his way over to the table where he left the rests of wound salve. Erik’s gaze is burning on his back, and Charles curses when the head of the jar slips from his grasp and shatters to bits on the freezing floor.

But this is a problem for tomorrow. Erik is breathing faster now, too, as Charles can’t help but notice with a deep, bone-gripping satisfaction when he kneels down on the mattress between the Fae’s legs and lifts his trim waist to prop it up with one of the crimson throw pillows. Then, he dips two fingers into the salve, grips one of Erik’s thighs and spreads the Fae’s legs wide.

At first, Erik is indifferent to Charles’ touch. His eyes track the wooden beams of timber criss-crossing on the ceiling as Charles smears his balls and flushed entrance with salve, and his lips move in silence as though chanting an invisible spell. Only his thighs flutter minutely, and Charles thinks it is lovely, thinks he will never get enough of Erik spread out open and vulnerable in front of him, bronze skin blushing all over.

Then, he slips the tip of his forefinger past the Fae’s sphincter, and this makes Erik’s eyes shoot all the way open, makes him tense and choke out a raucous, “ _Charles_.” His hands grapple for pursuit on the linen bedspread, and even though it is disobeying one of Charles’ direct orders, he finds he does not mind.

“Calm, Erik,” he murmurs, dropping a kiss on the juncture of Erik’s thigh and hip like a blessing, “calm your mind.”

And Erik calms, soothed by Charles’ lips mapping his hips and belly and thighs while he works the finger further in. Beneath his palm, Charles can feel Erik burning, senses the Fae’s jumble of thoughts falling back into place as he works him open gently.

“You are doing it again,” Erik gasps at once. “You are in my head–”

“Nonsense,” Charles chides, suddenly not so sure if he is maybe not lying to himself – though he is but an ordinary human, far too weak of mind to accomplish such high magic as mind spells.

This time, Erik sounds close to tearing up when he whispers, “I insist, my King. I can sense you inside of me, and it frightens me, for I have never felt so at peace.”

Charles doesn’t know what to say to that. So, he leans up, cups Erik’s cheek with his clean hand and wipes away the tears threatening to spill.

Shivering all over, the Fae melts into his touch, eyes falling shut even as the skin under the Cold Iron around his neck sizzles. It takes a dozen of Charles’ kisses for the tears to dry up, and another dozen for Erik to growl and speak, “Get on with it, will you?”

Charles just smiles and presses one last, chaste kiss to Erik’s lips, and the Fae groans and cranes his neck to chase after him. Charles has to curl his fingers into Erik’s hair and gently ease him back onto the covers for him to quieten down, before he slides down on the mattress, taking care not to jostle his bad leg.

There’s a tremor to Erik’s voice when he asks, thighs twitching in mistrust, “What are you doing?”

“Something which would make the chapel burst into holy flames if I said it out loud,” Charles replies, and then he leans forward, head between Erik’s legs, and begins to place kiss after searing kiss there.

Never before has Charles done this to another man – or to a woman, either, where he prefers other parts – and yet it is but a matter of heartbeats before Erik’s heated curses trail off into sweet whimpers and pleas, muffled when Charles reaches up and stuffs the corner of a pillow between the Fae’s teeth. He has to grip Erik’s waist to keep his hips from bucking as he stiffens his tongue and plunges in deeper, and his unshaven chin rubs up against soft skin which will be tender come morning, but the heat is worth it. Erik’s heat, and Erik’s sounds as he squirms helplessly above Charles, his smothered gasps which make his insides convulse and send endless thrills up Charles’ spine when he works a finger and then a second one in aside his tongue.

“Mercy, mercy, _please_ ,” Erik sobs, and, “Charles, Charles, _Charles_ ,” all over again, like a pagan prayer, until even words fail him and all he does is keen and arch his back and grip Charles’ hand on his thighs like there is no tomorrow, like he could die this very moment and be happy – and to his great terror, Charles finds he feels the same.

When there is no more breath left in his lungs and his heart beats as though it wants to rip loose from its moorings between his ribs, Charles leans back to survey his work – the silvern tear tracks on Erik’s cheeks, the rapid rise and fall of his chest, his white hair mussed against the dark wool overthrow which they have probably ruined forever – and grins. The Fae’s eyes snap down to look at him, glazed over though they are.

“You begged after all, and I didn’t even have to tell you to,” Charles muses.

He is promptly rewarded with a dirty look and a weak, “I should have slit your throat when I had the chance.”

His stiff leg aching, Charles shrugs and sits up. “You don’t mean that.”

“I will if you don’t finish what you started,” Erik slurs, and then he is surging forward, uncaring about his own taste on Charles’ lips as he draws him in by the collar of his undershirt and kisses him hungrily, greedily. Overwhelmed with surprise, Charles yields to the assault.

Their breaths mingle, their tongues clash, and then Erik draws back. “Take me, Charles,” he breathes, “make me yours, I want to be _yours_.”

Something should strike Charles as odd about this plea, should ring an alarm bell about this sudden change of mind – but there is a beautiful Fae in his arms _begging_ to be taken by him, and doubts are for the foolish and the wise. He bears Erik down on the covers, and the Fae slings his legs around his waist, clamping down like a vice as Charles struggles out of his braies.

“Such an honourable King Westchester has,” Erik whispers in his ear, fingers kneading Charles’ shoulders. “Would not take me without my outright consent.”

“I’m glad at least you do not think me depraved,” Charles chuckles, and he knows Erik is about to bite back, to say something witty, but he can wait no longer, damn his foolish ideals, damn his throbbing leg. Carefully, he lines himself up with the Fae’s entrance and pushes inside.

Erik’s eyes widen, and a jolt goes through his body, strung taut in Charles’ arms like the chord of a lyre. “More,” he gasps, “oh please, more, _please_ ,” even as tears begin to bead together at the corner of his eyes, as his limbs spasm with the strange intrusion.

“No,” Charles murmurs, “you are something to be savoured.”

And then, he makes true on his words. Erik curses him when he begins to move, slowly until he bottoms out, revelling in Erik’s sweet little gasps as he impales him on his prick, fills him to the brim, makes him squirm and push back and cry out silently.

“Faster, damn you,” the Fae growls, unsatisfied with Charles’ languid pace and yet unable to do anything about it.

Charles simply leans down and catches the single brilliant tear pearling over Erik’s cheekbone, tastes its salt on his lips as he moves on to Erik’s temple, his earlobe, the soft juncture of his jaw and neck.

“Patience, my beautiful, my darling.”

Erik sobs dryly, once and with no real fervour behind it – but it is enough. Enough for Charles to gather Erik’s wrists in one hand and pin them to the mattress over his head, enough for him to grip his Fae’s waist so tightly that bruises will bloom there in the morning, enough for him to start driving into Erik in earnest this time, making him slide over the covers with each thrust.

Erik shouts, surprised despite being the cause of provocation, and then he is laughing breathily even as tears spill from his eyes, as he moans and keens and the collar of Cold Iron reddens his skin.

“Yes,” he gasps, “just so, my King, yours, _yours_ ,” and Charles leans forward to smother his words with kisses until their high crashes over him like a wave, blindingly white, and all he tastes and hears and sees is Erik, _Erik_ , his Erik.

By the time they have cleaned themselves up arbitrarily, the flames in the fireplace have waned and the cold is seeping in through the cracks and chinks of the stone floor. So, they flee under the thick covers of Charles’ expansive bed.

Erik nestles up against Charles’ backside, his hands almost solemnly tender as they slip under Charles’ arms to fold together over his sternum. The Cold Iron collar’s edge is digging into Charles’ shoulder blade, and when he shifts, a sudden burst of pain makes him hiss.

“ _God_ in Heaven,” he groans, “what did you do to my back?”

Erik sounds terribly smug when he murmurs, “My fingernails might have exacted revenge on your shoulders for the torture earlier. You did not notice since you were far too wrapped up in… _me_.”

So that is why the skin on Charles’ back feels like it has been set on fire. He sighs.

“I was only clipping your nails.”

“’Twas torture,” Erik insists, his smile brushing against the back of Charles’ neck, and really, who is Charles to contradict such an ironclad argument?

Smiling himself, he takes the Fae’s hands in his. Warmth is once again coursing through them, no longer the draughty, brittle cold of the prison cell far, far below their resting bodies.

Everything is well. Time passes.

And yet, there is one question which will not let his mind slip away into dreams. Erik, too, is only waiting for Charles to ask, thoughts turning round and round in his head – even though he should not know, Charles is aware of this with an uncanny certainty, like he knows that Cold Iron makes a Fae’s skin blister or knows that the sparrows fly south in winter.

“Why did you _really_ stay?” he finally whispers, hot breath fanning over Erik’s knuckles in his grasp. “Erik, why are there so many of my people showing up dead in the part of the woods where I found you? Why is the Veil thinning?”

“I stayed–” The smile is gone from Erik’s voice, like Charles knew it would be, but he still feels so incredibly sorry- “because you are my only hope, Charles.”

Charles’ breath halts in his lungs. Erik’s hands in his suddenly feel so, so far away.

“You knew of me before you came here?”

“Betsy told me of you. She told me she had once been nursemaid to a sweet little prince with a high affinity for twisting people’s thoughts – his potential yet unreached, rumoured to be even beyond the mightiest Fae’s – and that she had to abandon his studies when his stepfather usurped the throne and chased her away.” Erik’s voice is quiet as he talks, almost pensive, and for the first time, Charles asks himself about the Fae’s true age. He looks so young, and yet, there is a gravity to his words only many a lifetime could have inspired. “You were that prince. And now you have grown up into a wise and strong man, a _kind_ man, and even though you know nothing of your potential, you are the most powerful weapon I could have ever wished for.”

There is a hollow place in Charles’ chest, just below his heart, and it is opening up painfully at the Fae’s words, ready to devour him from the inside.

“I am not the sorrowless boy I once was,” he says and lets go of Erik’s hands to turn away, to pull himself from the Fae’s arms and stare up into the darkness listlessly. “Life has hardened me. I can be of no use to you, Erik from Eisenhardt, for I am but a rotten King.”

Erik is back by his side in a heartbeat, each breath mingling with Charles’ as he leans over him. “But Charles, _Charles_! You could have killed me.” His fingertips run over Charles’ cheekbone, searching in the twilight, tender as though they were caressing a sculpture of gossamer ice. “You could have left me to die. You could have done unspeakable things to me, things which men with a truly good heart abhor – men like you. There is still good in you.”

Charles draws a shaky breath. His cheeks are not wet. They are not.

“So you were willing to give your life trying to deceive me, to _use_ me – for what?”

“It might have been nothing more but a game at first, yes, but Charles, if I told you that–”

“ _For what?_ ”

Above him, Erik is silent. Terribly silent, deathly silent, and Charles is tempted to reach out and feel if the Fae hasn’t suddenly vanished into thin air at seeing its objective recede more and more-

Then, Erik speaks, with an earnestness that weighs Charles down and threatens to crush his heart.

“My people,” the Fae says. “I did it for my people, my tribe, my loved ones.” His voice softens, low and intimate all of a sudden. “And now, I am doing it for you.”

Charles gives in to the temptation, reaches up to feel out Erik’s chin, his slender neck, the unruly curls just behind his ears. “Doing it for me?” he asks, breathless when Erik leans into his touch.

“We are both captives here,” the Fae whispers. “You are both jailer and prisoner in this castle, and though you do not want it to be true, you know it. There is more to life than being King.”

Charles’ whole being shrinks back as though he was standing in the dark at the very edge of an endlessly deep precipice. And yet, he can’t keep himself from asking, from wanting to know, to _learn_.

“Who are you?” he murmurs. “Who are you really?”

“I am Erik from Eisenhardt, lover of Charles Xavier, King of Westchester, and I beseech him to come with me and aid me in freeing my Fae people from a bloodthirsty tyrant who rules unjustly Beyond The Veil.” Erik’s hand comes up hastily to clutch Charles’ at his cheek, and Charles can almost taste the bitter-yellow tinge of his thoughts. This is Erik’s all-or-none, his victory or his demise. “You may be unlearned yet, but we still have time. Follow me to the Lands Beyond The Veil, let us teach you the arts of mind-weaving and thought-spells, and fight by my side. You have my heart, but if you come to our aid in defeating the tyrant Shaw, you will have the gratitude of a whole people.”

Silence descends after Erik’s impassioned plea. The Fae’s thoughts are racing beneath Charles’ fingertips, weighing his chances and secondary, tertiary plans. This was Erik’s last resort, Charles realises with unease.

Weakly, he objects, “I have my own people here. They need their King, a figurehead to unite them all–”

“They are not being slaughtered and enslaved as we are,” Erik hisses. “You have your generals. I have caught glimpses of the blonde one, the one who disarmed a warrior in full regalia with but a stroke of a wooden stick, or the ink-skinned one with thunder in her voice when she speaks. Give your rule to them until you return – and you shall return if we triumph over Shaw the Usurper.”

“I trust Raven,” Charles sighs, “even if she is occasionally rumoured to have seduced yet another unfortunate nobleman's wife or daughter – or mother. And I would lay my life in Ororo’s hands.”

“See?” Erik sounds breathless, exalted almost. His fingers tighten around Charles’. “Come with me. Leave behind the well-trodden paths of this life and lay aside your race’s endless strife with mine to restore peace to both our realms.”

Sudden resolve congealing in Charles’ mind, he draws his hand from Erik’s and gets up to light the candleholder on the bedside table, then, carefully avoiding the splinters from the medicine jar’s lid, makes his way over to a chest of drawers by the window - the same on which the remnants of the wound salve are still trailing. His leg aches when he bends down to pry a compartment open, and he grinds his teeth.

“What are you doing?” Erik has sat up in alarm, the candlelight of the flame rendering his perched form in undulating gold and silver.

“What I should have done far sooner already.” The secret second floor in the drawer clicks open when Charles brushes over its edge at just the right angle, and he reaches inside to close his fingers around the object he is looking for. “The Cold Iron burns, does it not?”

“Terribly,” Erik confirms. In his eyes and thoughts, Charles can read neither hesitation nor shame about being honest.

As quickly as his stiff leg allows it, he is across the room again, one hand under Erik’s chin as he lifts it to fit the key into the Cold Iron collar’s lock. The circlet of cool metal creaks in agony at its two halves being parted, and Erik breathes in sharply when the cool air hits the strip of red-raw, blistered skin around his neck, and then Charles sends the collar flying across the room to clatter to the ground in a dusty corner.

“I am so sorry,” he breathes, falling to his knees in front of the Fae who is watching him warily, “I have treated you horribly.”

A grin is tugging at Erik’s lips, and even as he reaches out to clasp Charles’ hand in his, an otherworldly shimmer runs over his body and the blisters recede until there is nothing but smooth, unblemished skin where the wound left by the Cold Iron should be.

“I have lived worse. Far worse,” Erik is saying, unaware of Charles staring in frightened wonder at the change. “You did what you felt needed to be done to keep your own life safe, until you could trust me. I am just glad you have learned that you can. But look–” His eyes focus on a spot behind Charles, on the bull-glass window giving view onto the snow-doused planes of Westchester- “dawn is breaking.”

And really – when Charles sneaks a glance over his shoulder, he sees the grey of a new day bleeding into the sky’s frazzled edges.

“Well then,” he says, grunting as he hoists himself up onto his feet, “it is high time we got going.”

They ride West, for the foot of the mountain where Charles shot Erik down and where the Veil Between The Realms is at its thinnest. At their back, the sun rises like the burning red eye of the Heavens, setting the vast plains of snow in front of them ablaze.

Charles knows that the guards stationed in the West tower of the castle must see them set out – two riders sidling out of the rarely used side-gate, saddlebags packed for what seems to be a journey of the long kind, their horses leaving two parallel trails of hoofprints – and yet, they remain undisturbed. When he shoots Erik a questioning look, the Fae just winks and points first at his, then at Charles’ temples.

_A sweet little prince with a high affinity for twisting people’s thoughts._

“I am not doing it on purpose,” he defends himself, knuckles whitening as he grips the reins of his stocky chestnut stallion tighter.

“Of course, my King,” Erik concedes mockingly, his hips rolling in time with the movements of his dappled silver mare. “You seem to be a natural after all.”

Charles considers throwing the Fae a playful string of carefully selected curses but thinks better of it and settles on a dirty look instead. Erik smirks back, pale eyes sparkling.

Charles thinks he might drown in the sudden wave of affection which washes over him at the sight.

Erik is as beautiful in the light of the sun as he is in the flickering candle glow. He rides without a saddle and with his feet and chest bare, unfazed by the biting winter winds – Charles himself is thickly swathed in layers of leather and fur, desperately seeking to keep the warmth in and the cold out. He is no Fae, unfit for the outdoors and the cruelties of nature, and as the day draws on and they travel in companionable silence, he begins to question himself.

Will he truly be what Erik came looking for, here, in the world of soft-skinned, gullible humans? Can he ever be more than a means to an end, an asset to a strange people’s salvation?

Does the Fae harbour the exact same doubts?

“If the sky stays clear like this, I will certainly freeze to death during the night,” he finally says, tugging at the bridle to bring their horses closer. His breath bleeds from between his lips in wisps of congealed white.

Erik turns to face him, the sun slanting beautifully over his clear-cut features. There is not a trace of mockery left in his eyes when he replies, “I shall keep you warm. You and I, Charles, we will make it.”

Charles can’t resist it – he takes one hand from his reins to grasp Erik’s and squeeze it tightly.

“Promise?”

Erik’s smile is brighter than the sun, brighter than the moon and the stars and all the fires in the world.

“Promise.”

And Charles trusts him.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading 💖 As you well know, kudos and especially comments are very much appreciated!


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